[* Daar is bv die United Patriots Front (UPF): “Among the loose constellation of extreme groups which make up Reclaim Australia, the UPF were the most militant. They were fascist in the plainest sense of the word” (2305). Kurmelovs gebruik die term “fascis” glad te graag as hy iemand wil slegsê – kyk hier onder.]

Die kernprobleem wat die kiesers al hoe meer met die politiek het, is die politici. Die politici is dikwels kansvatters wat nie die mas in die openbare sektor kan opkom nie en hulle dan tot die politiek wend, wat buitensporige vergoeding en byvoordele bied, terwyl geen bewys van formele kwalifikasies of prestasie vereis word nie. Nigel Farage het as leier van die United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) bekendheid verwerf. Hy sê: “People are not disenchanted with politics. They are disconnected from the politically-correct carer class of politicians. Just look at them. It is like a game. They are all fighting desperately to hold the middle ground. They are made up of focus-groupies, triangulators, dog-whistlers, politicians who daren’t say what they really mean. And we [UKIP] are different from that. We stand up and tell it like it is and whether people agree with it or nor at least they know where we stand … and I’m proud of that” ( Matthew Lynn, Independently minded: The rise of Nigel Farage, Endeavor Press, 2014, 67p; Amazon Kindle $4.59, 73).

UKIP “is an uprising against a professional, managerial class of politicians, and against the alliance of big business and big government that is not only estranged from ordinary people, but increasingly doesn’t seem to care much about them either” (91). “Democracies had been hi-jacked by professional politicians, creating a network of parties, think-tanks, bureaucracies, lobbyists and political correspondents that talked mainly to each other and for whom politics was really just a career rather than a calling” (651). Die Europese Unie, volgens Farage, “has been captured by a bureaucracy, which has put its own survival above any other objective” (508). “UKIP became the protest party, the anti-system party” (690).

“Farage is well aware that campaigning as an anti-politician is a big part of his appeal” (708). YouTube word beskryf as “the single most important factor in the rise of [UKIP]” (381). Farage het 100 000 volgelinge op Twitter (385). Die naam Reclaim Australia is eintlik dieselfde as UKIP se slagspreuk: “We want our country back” (86). “Withdrawing from Europe [is] a way of re-claiming [British] sovereignty and the power to make decisions locally” (809). Al hoe meer Australiërs eis hulle land terug omdat hulle voel dat die blanke inwoners deur nie-wit immigrante uit Asië en Afrika verswelg word.

Die inkrimping van die tradisioneel groot politieke partye in Australië en die opkoms van kleiner partye en die verkiesing van onafhanklikes bring mee dat koalisies gevorm moet word voordat daar ‘n regering kan wees. In hierdie situasie “the country independents became kingmakers” (Kurmelovs 1576). In koalisie maak hulle dit vir die groter partye moontlik om ‘n regering te vorm, wat beteken “power is a cooperative relationship” (1616). “With the trend towards government by coalition and a persistently fractured Senate, populists are powerful. Each represents a regional blend on the same general theme, operates on the same basic principles, and will often work with each other at the expense of the major parties. They are, in a manner of speaking, a decentralised, emergent political party” (3031). As gevolg van die moontlikheid van koalisievorming “voting for a minor party or independent candidate is a lottery, as there’s no way of knowing where your vote will end up. This may be true, but then politics itself has never been a perfectly rational process” (3053).

[* Trump se verkiesing is in Australië onder meer verwelkom as “the ‘beginning of the Western spring’, a reference to the Arab Spring that toppled autocratic regimes across the Middle East” (1465).

** “Populism … is radical democracy and a by-product of neglect or indifference by the status quo. It works by taking different interests and binding them together against a common enemy, a coalition of the underdogs united, despite the traditional antagonisms or apparent contradictions between them, along a clear overarching theme” (3015). “Populism in itself isn’t a bad thing, but it’s what you combine it with that makes it potent. Mixed with the left, it focuses on those with money and power. Blended with the right, it takes aim at immigrants, refugees and enemies of the nation. Keep it in the centre and everyone ends up unsatisfied. Put it in a coalition and its worst impulses are tempered, allowing it to do some good by pushing for reform in those area that sorely need it. Give it majority rule, things can turn ugly” (3020) – bv die ANC se mobilisering van anti-blanke sentiment.]

Die saambindende faktor in die teks is Pauline Hanson (gebore in 1954), “an iconic Australian brand” (202) en die leier van die politieke party One Nation. Sedert 2016 is sy en drie van haar partygenote senatore in die federale parlement in Canberra. One Nation is soos volg gekarakteriseer: “We are a predominantly working-class nationalist party – what some may call a ‘right wing’ workers’ party” (1407) – dus nie aan dieselfde kant as die Arbeidersparty nie. “What makes us a ‘workers’ party’ is that the membership and support base of One Nation is made up of often poorly paid, hardworking Aussies whose basic decency, quiet patriotism, strong moral compass and fierce work ethic define them as the heart and soul of our nation” (1413). Wat hieruit afgelei kan word, is dat One Nation se ondersteuners blankes is. Een van hulle huldig die volgende menings: “I’m not against immigration, we’ve had good people come into this country before. They didn’t live on handouts. I’m here [at a One Nation meeting] to stand for Australian values our forefathers fought for and to see that the Australian lifestyle, culture and laws that we have always known, carry on into the future” (2276).

Kurmelovs skryf: “Once Trump had gone global, all it would take was one heartfelt lie in a post-fact universe [or “post-truth politics” – 468]* for One Nation to sweep through those areas of the country that were so cynical, so withdrawn, they would turn the whole system on its head” (180). “One Nation shared its name with the title of a speech Don Watson had written for Labor prime minister Paul Keating [1991-1996], and she barnstormed the country to spread the word” (240).

[* Democracy functions when the losing side of an election continues to see their quality of life get better, despite the result” (2993). In hierdie sin is daar in die nuwe Suid-Afrika nie ‘n funksionerende demokrasie nie.]

Die persepsie bestaan dat immigrante werksgeleenthede van Australiese burgers ontneem. Hanson “was someone who preyed on the hopes and frustrations of working-class and country people” (85). “Hanson drew her support from women, the elderly, those without university qualifications and those in trades – who were all angry at the government” (3004). Kurmelovs wou eerstehands kennis met regse politici en hulle ondersteuners maak. “If I wanted to understand something [! – not someone/somebody] like Pauline Hanson with any real clarity, if I wanted to know what the hell happened out there, I had to be out there with the rest of them” (101).

Hanson het verwag dat Australië dieselfde koersverandering sou ondergaan as wat deur Trump en Brexit gesimboliseer word (281). Sy bewonder ook Vladimir Poetin se leierskap (2872). Daar is myns insiens heelwat onderliggende distansiëring, selfs vyandigheid, van Kurmelovs in die volgende twee aanhalings oor One Nation: “This [2016] was a turning point. Until then, the party had been a small but fanatical movement of Australian nationalists, each chasing their own unique vision of an Australia that no longer existed.* Then, it was a protectionist party, of the ‘Buy Australian’ variety. Now, it was hard-wiring itself into international networks of climate-change deniers and obscure ideological driven think tanks. In other words, One Nation was now speaking with an American accent” (310). “After all, she [Hanson] had done it first, before Brexit, before Trump, all the way back in ’96. She had championed a bizarre [?] ethno-nationalism before the internet helped similar groups network their way across the planet, and it had made her one of the most recognisable Australians … No, she was no Trump, but they were cut from the same cloth” (337).

Hanson word beskryf as “a product of random chance that has rewritten the rule book” (3059). “Without her name, One Nation is nothing” (3105). “No amount of data … could have predicted that one racist letter to a Brisbane newspaper would have triggered a series of events that saw Pauline Hanson pushed onto the national stage, leading to a fundamental restructering of the right in Australian politics with long-term consequences for issues as diverse as Aboriginal land rights, refugee policy and even climate change” (3070). “She is a woman of broad strokes, with an aggressive, short-term, transactional approach to politics and an intuitive feel for exploiting people’s arrogrance, anger and hurt, all in the right place, at the write time” (3082). “The people who vote One Nation … may not believe half of what Hanson says, if they’re being honest, but that is not the point. All that matters is that she connects, on some level, with their frustration, their resentment, their need to be recognised as clued in to what’s ‘really going on’, and that she seems to scare the living hell out of the bastards. The louder the outrage, the sweeter the sound” (3093).